Every industry in Australia has a legal and moral obligation to provide a safe work environment for employees. Failing to meet occupational health and safety standards can result in severe consequences including injured employees, expensive fines and even lawsuits.
Warehouses can be particularly dangerous places to work because of high levels of transport and stock often operating inside a busy environment. According to Worksafe Australia, 70% of warehouse related injuries are due to dangerous manual handling, trips, slips and falls.
One of the key components to better manage a warehouse and minimise accidents and injuries is by having an efficient and effective storage system in place. Modern warehouse storage systems are essential for keeping everything organised, but they should also be designed to keep your inventory stowed away properly and safely to protect your employees from potential hazards. They should also be checked regularly to ensure they meet safety standards and WorkSafe guidelines.
Updating your warehouse storage system also has major productive benefits too, such as:
- Increasing productivity lines
- Reducing loss or damage to inventory
- Improving storage access to easily locate items
- Optimising storage capacity and warehouse output
- Enhancing employee satisfaction
The layout of your warehouse is your foundation to ensure safe and productive operations. Before you assess the safety of your current storage systems in your warehouse, you need to understand the importance of a functioning storage system and give thought to your warehouse layout. Here are three basic principles you need to understand:
Flow
In a society where delivery windows are competitively shrinking, one of the most important objectives in any modern warehouse design is to create the fastest input and output of inventory. However, the flow of operations needs to be optimised for both productivity and safety.
Warehouses endure very busy operations with multiple staff assigned to several tasks in the same areas, at the same time. Your first priority should be to eliminate as much movement and disruption as possible to prevent cross-flow clashes. Any equipment should be placed as close as possible to where it is most often needed, to reduce wasting time and to maximise the flow of activity.
Accessibility
Whatever the size of your facility and inventory items, anything that is stored on pallets across your warehouse should be easily accessible. Proper accessibility is imperative to workplace safety as it helps workers handle their duties with ease, prevents accidents, reduces risks and smooths out traffic, which can delay logistics.
The key to accessibility is designing your warehouse so that pallet rack rows are wide enough to accommodate equipment and trucks while stocking and stacking items strategically for minimal interference with one another.
Space
Regardless of how large your warehouse is, you need to consider how you can maximise space to avoid overcrowding your pallet racking, which can be extremely dangerous. While many businesses opt for moving to a larger facility, this can be a costly and time consuming process. Instead, try to take advantage of the vertical space you have available.
There are a wide variety of vertical racks and freestanding equipment to help you make the most of warehouse capacity. Mezzanine floors are a great solution for optimising upwards space for both simple storage needs and for heavy duty items. There are also multiple storage systems which can be flexibly rearranged to accommodate any future inventory changes.
At All Storage Systems, we strive to improve efficiencies. We offer complete warehouse design services from layout to product selection, warehouse auditing and complete installation. No matter your industry, our team of specialists can design the perfect shelving and storage systems to suit your warehouse.
Contact our sales team on 1800 772 726 or sales@allstoragesystems.com.au for advice, book an audit or organise a free fitout consultation.
